CES 2026 kicks off. Here's everything you need to know

Just a few more hours and the curtain will rise on the Consumer Electronic Show, the world's most important trade fair for consumer electronics and new technologies, scheduled from 6 to 9 January, but in fact already active from the weekend of 3 and 4 with events and previews reserved for the press and trade professionals. Thirteen venues including hotels, convention centres and casinos (over 2.6 million square metres of exhibition space) will welcome the thousands of exhibitors arriving from all over the world. The hope, once again, is that it will be an edition that goes beyond the showcase of products that will see the market in the coming months: the Las Vegas show is the occasion in which the technology industry measures itself, defines its agenda of priorities and anticipates the trends that will mark the next twelve months. Artificial intelligence will presumably dominate the scene among solutions dedicated to autonomous mobility (the Sony Honda Mobility joint venture will unveil its smart electric car), digital health, energy efficiency, robotics (for the home and factories, with models capable of understanding physical space) and new entertainment formats. The leitmotif of this year's edition, according to some of the leading American technology publications, is a further normalisation of AI, which will be increasingly integrated in devices: there will be much talk of agents capable of operating directly 'on devices', with further steps forward in terms of productivity and customer experience.

Opening the dances, on Monday 5 at the Venetian, will be the keynote by Lisa Su, CEO of AMD, followed the next day by the Consumer Technology Association's institutional speeches. Also on Tuesday 6, Yannick Bolloré, CEO and Chairman of Havas (as well as Chairman of Vivendi), will speak on communication and media, while Lenovo has chosen the Sphere to reinforce its narrative on AI 'for everyone' in an event (scheduled for Tuesday 6) that promises to be one of the most spectacular and will see the participation of the Chinese giant's number one, Yuanqing Yang, alongside the executives of Nvidia (Jensen Huang), Intel (Lip-Bu Tan) and Qualcomm (Cristiano Amon) and FIFA president Gianni Infantino, to remind us of the increasingly solid marriage between sport (the World Cup is being held in the USA in July) and tech. Most of the most relevant announcements are concentrated in the first 48 hours, and Samsung opens the conference ballet as usual (Sunday 4) with 'The First Look', where several announcements dedicated to new experiences in the AI field developed by the Korean giant are expected. On Monday, events are scheduled by LG (with the 'Innovation in Tune with You' event focusing on AI and home automation), Bosch, Hisense and, an absolute first for CES, Lego.

For some years now, Korean companies have chosen to anticipate much of their news before the official opening of the show, and this year is no exception. LG Electronics has already made official the debut of its first ultra-high-end RGB TV, the evo model (winner of Innovation Awards), a screen that marks a major step forward from MiniLed technology and boasts the Sound Suite modular audio system with Dolby Atmos FlexConnect integration, and a line of 'art TVs' designed to integrate into home environments, and will bring its new domestic robot CLOiD into the spotlight for the first time, a project that synthesises the Korean company's strategy in the field of robotics applied to everyday life and in the wake of the 'Zero Labor Home, Makes Quality Time' vision. CLOiD has been conceived as a real home assistant, capable of moving around indoors and performing a wide range of tasks related to the management of modern homes, thanks to its two articulated arms, each with seven degrees of freedom, and five motorised fingers per hand, designed to guarantee high dexterity even in the most delicate operations. Central to the humanoid experience is the 'Affectionate Intelligence' technology, which aims to make interaction more natural and progressively more personalised. Samsung, for its part, is responding by expanding its Micro RGB range already seen in 2025 (with new models available in sizes from 55 to 115 inches) and relaunching on the monitor front with 6K models and glasses-free 3D solutions. Several updates are also announced for the Bespoke AI line of home appliances, with advanced solutions for fabric care and more intuitive temperature control (new products on the launch pad include the WindFree Pro air conditioner and the flagship Jet Bot Steam Ultra robot hoover). Arousing curiosity is the global launch of The Freestyle+, a portable projector with artificial intelligence and immersive 360-degree sound designed to offer an even more flexible and personalised entertainment experience: designed for streaming, gaming and everyday viewing, it allows for instant set-up and intuitive use in a wide variety of spaces. In addition to Micro RGB technology, which uses millions of tiny red, green and blue LEDs to create images offering superior colour coverage compared to traditional TVs, watch out for moves by Sony, which may present its own 'True RGB' technology, based on Mini Led backlighting with coloured sub-pixels and capable of combining high brightness and colour fidelity without the limitations of Oled panels. CES also remains one of the main stages for launching new generations of processors and on this front, AMD is expected to unveil its new Ryzen chips based on the Zen 5 architecture, together with AI upscaling technologies, and Intel, which has already confirmed the arrival of its Core Ultra Series 3 Panther Lake processors based on a 2 nanometre production process, destined for premium notebooks and a central element of the Santa Clara company's 'AI PC' strategy. Qualcomm, for its part, continues its offensive in the world of laptops with the new Snapdragon X2, reinforcing the idea of an increasingly credible alternative to ARM technology in the Windows computer market. It remains to be seen what Nvidia, and above all its volcanic CEO, will pull out of his hat: whether the content of his speech will be dedicated to AI and its various applications is obvious, but whether Las Vegas will be the stage for an announcement with a bang we will find out on Monday 5 January.